This collection of Mikhail Glinka's youthful chamber
music is a lot of pleasant fun. All written by the time he was 38, for
a variety of instrumental combinations, you could consider it practice
for the days when he began forging a new “Russian” musical
style. Here the influences are the late Viennese classical tradition
of Mozart and Haydn, as well as Italian operas like the two he uses
for material here.

Those operatic fantasies are the highlights, I think. The Divertimento
on Bellini's La sonnambula and Serenade on Donizetti's Anna
Bolena are each really enjoyable pieces, mixing up the tunes and
delightful solos. With the Italians’ surprising boundless melodies,
Glinka is able to choreograph great conversational exchanges around
them all, the piano often taking a central role. Caution: the CD case
is incorrect about the instrumentations; the bassoon, double bass, or
horn are on track 6, not 1.

There are two works for solo harp, both very appealing and fairly short;
Natalia Shameyeva is a good advocate for both the Mozart variations
- on an aria by Papageno - and the nocturne, but she's been recorded
in an acoustic that's jarringly different from and inferior to the rest
of the CD. The viola sonata, which must be ground-breaking given how
rare solos for that instrument were, is also unusual in that it's only
two movements long, ending with a larghetto. This isn't by design; Glinka
never got around to finishing the rondo finale.

Despite the reservation I mentioned about the sound quality of the harp
recordings, and the general caveat that this is a re-release from 1993,
this CD is worth recommending. The booklet essay far exceeds Brilliant's
usual standards except for the error mentioned above, and the price
is right. If you want to try an hour of diverting early-romantic chamber
music, you can do a lot worse.